194 On Elucidating the Natural History of Man 



sity of not ranging beyond the limits of the circle of anthropo- 

 logical facts ; every fact borrowed from the other branches of 

 the science would only be a source of error, and nothing more. 

 But if the physical variations of man exhibit manifest relations 

 to the variations of animals, if they consist in similar effects 

 ■which are explicable by the same causes, and reducible to the 

 same laws, then analogy becomes, in the study of the races of 

 mankind, a guide as useful, as in the former supposition it was 

 dangerous. And, finally, if we are led to recognise that these 

 same physical variations in man, generally analogous in their 

 nature to the variations of the different races of animals, are, in 

 particular, exactly and in every respect legitimate objects of 

 comparison with those of the domestic breeds, the study of these 

 races of men, and that of the domestic races of animals, mani- 

 festly becomes a reciprocal and necessary complement to the 

 other ; and to isolate them is nothing else than to suppress 

 among the data of the difficult problems to which they relate, 

 one-half of the elements which might and ought to contribute 

 to their solution. 



Thus have we indicated one class of applications which have 

 hitherto been almost entirely neglected, although the relations 

 whence they are derived have been for a long time noticed, but 

 in a very confused manner. We now proceed to a second series 

 of applications which have still more completely been overlooked, 

 and the very principle of which has scarcely been recognised in 

 the science. 



With this object in view, let us for a few moments consider, 

 in the abstract, the analogy, on which we have been dwelling, 

 which exists betwixt the variations of the human race and those 

 of the domestic animals ; and without resting either on the na- 

 ture of the changes in these latter, or their mode of production, 

 let us confine ourselves to the consideration of the effects, in so 

 far as they relate to the general cause. 



The variations in the domestic races are of two kinds ; 1st, 

 Variations of the races in relation to the wild or primitive race ; 

 and, 2d, Variations of the races as among themselves. Both of 

 these have been attributed from the commencement of the 

 science to the influence of domestication, and the remarks which 

 we have offered above suffice to establish that this explanation 



